1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a contact and a connection unit provided with the contact.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there has been proposed a photovoltaic module wiring terminal box (connection unit) including a terminal box and a plurality of terminal strips (contacts) (see Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2002-359389 (Paragraphs 0014 to 0016, and FIG. 6)).
The terminal box comprises a box body made of an ABS resin and a cover made of an ABS resin. The box body has a box shape that opens upward. The cover is fitted to the top of the box body via a gasket to cover the opening of the box body.
The terminal strips are provided such that each three terminal strips are integrally formed as one set, and each terminal strip has a base piece and a folded-back piece. A protruding piece is continuous with one end of the base piece. The protruding piece is substantially at right angles to the base piece. The base piece has a rising piece formed on a central portion thereof. The rising piece extends substantially at right angles to the base piece. A foremost end of the rising piece is folded back. The aforementioned folded-back piece has one end continuous with the other end of the base piece, and is inclined with respect to the base piece at an angle of approximately 45°. The folded-back piece is formed with a latching hole for receiving the foremost end of the rising piece. Further, the other end of the folded-back piece is formed with a protruding piece which is brought into abutment with the protruding piece formed on the one end of the base piece. The terminal strips are arranged within the box body.
To connect a terminal leg of a bypass diode (electronic component) or an electrode (contact portion) of a photovoltaic module (object to be connected) to one of the terminal strips, the terminal leg of the bypass diode or the electrode of the photovoltaic module is put in a cutout formed in the one end of the base piece, when the terminal strip is in a state where the foremost end of the rising piece is not inserted through the latching hole of the folded-back piece. Then, the other end of the folded-back piece is pressed toward the base piece, whereby the terminal leg or the electrode is sandwiched by the protruding piece of the folded-back piece and the protruding piece of the base piece. At this time, the foremost end of the rising piece is relatively inserted through the latching hole of the folded-back piece, whereby the foremost end of the rising piece is hooked on a rim of the latching hole of the folded-back piece, which fixes the folded-back piece. The bypass diode or the photovoltaic module is thus connected to the terminal strips.
In the above-mentioned photovoltaic module wiring terminal box, since three terminal strips are integrated into one set of terminal strips, to connect one terminal leg of the bypass diode, the one set of terminal strips is required. The one set of terminal strips has a width considerably larger than that of the terminal leg of the bypass diode. Therefore, to connect a plurality of bypass diodes, it is required to arrange a plurality of sets of terminal strips in a direction of the width thereof, which results in an increased width dimension of the photovoltaic module wiring terminal box.